gun control

McCain and Guns

Posted on by Caleb

Needs some work, according to Chris Cox.

“John McCain still has some work to do to give them a comfort level,” Chris Cox, executive director of the NRA, said during an interview with The Hill. “Truth be told, he’s not there yet.”

…

Specifically, McCain played a leading role in crafting the campaign finance reform law that bears his name and that also enraged many lobbying groups. The NRA was one of the most outspoken.

…

Cox said that members have expressed “a lot of borderline resentment in some circles” over McCain. But because of the outright disdain for both of the Democratic candidates’ past positions on gun control, the NRA is actively seeking a way for McCain to directly address its members and smooth over past troubles.

That last section is the one I want to focus on with regards to McCain, and its something that I touched on the podcast interview I did yesterday as well; despite my issues with McCain on gun shows and other stuff, he is a lot better than any of the alternatives that are currently out there.

McCain was on the amicus brief that the 55 Senators signed in support of Dick Heller in DC vs Heller, and has taken some steps to reach out to gun owners, but there is work to be done. However, it is my hope that he does make a concerted effort to reach out to gun owners to address those issues. He is better than Hillary or Obama, but I agree with Chris Cox in that he needs to make an effort to reach out to gun owners and establish is bona fides as it were.

gun control

Prop H Dead in San Fran

Posted on by Caleb

I would have had this up earlier, but I was…distracted by Mrs. Ahab.

In good news, the California State Supreme Court has struck down San Francisco’s Proposition H as being in violation of California state law. If you’re not familiar with it, Prop H was San Fran’s extremely draconian gun ban, which would have banned “the manufacture, distribution, sale and transfer of firearms and ammunition within San Francisco.”

Check out the presser from NRA-ILA.  This is a rare win for California gun owners, because San Francisco’s avenues of appeal for their gun ban have now been exhausted, and Prop H is dead.

blogs

Repeal the 17th Amendment

Posted on by Caleb

A buddy of mine that I often talk politics with asked me recently why I’m opposed to the direct election of Senators.  I walked through all the reasons I don’t like it, but wasn’t able to wrap it up neatly for him.

This morning, I emailed him a link to Tam’s post on the 17th Amendment, because she quite eloquently summarizes everything that I don’t like about the 17th, and why it was such a blow to the system of government that the Founding Fathers had designed.   It’s a great post, and she does manage to tie it up with that bow that I was looking for a few weeks ago.

Ultimately though, I agree with Sebastian who says:

The real problem is that our culture worships at the altar of democratic governance.  Power to the people, and all that.  Not enough stop and think that maybe the people, when they act collectively through voting, are actually pretty collectively stupid.

Reminds of the line from Men in Black: “A person is smart, people are dumb, panicky, and stupid”; or something along those lines.

gun control

Which side plays dirty?

Posted on by Caleb

I have heard on many occasions people accuse NRA of playing dirty, or using cheap tricks to further their political point.  I have always disagreed, and pointed to NRA’s track record in that regards, but it’s usually to no avail.  I have also usually not pointed to cheap and dirty tactics from the other side, but that stops today – namely because the Brady Campaign is doing something so crass that it’s repulsive.

They were planning a protest at the memorial service for the 1-year anniversary of VA Tech; however they were denied a permit by the school.  The school says that the memorial is not for making political points, and is sticking to their guns.  The Brady Campaign however plans on crashing the memorial and staging a “lie-in” with or without a permit.

The Brady Campaign sent out a media advisory last Thursday announcing the event, planned in conjunction with the gun control group ProtestEasyGuns.com. Hamm said the gun-control groups had not discussed the event with the university, but he was initially discouraged by what he saw as a hard-line stance by the university against issuing a permit. He said this morning that the event would go ahead as scheduled — permit or no permit.

I see that Petey Hamm is keeping it classy as usual.  The real kicker is that even the student body has expressed concern about the Brady Campaign’s planned protest.  The Student Government passed a resolution requesting that any potential protesters respect the community’s desires and not make a political mess out of April 16th.

Like I said, Brady Campaign: Keepin’ it Classy.  Uncle has more on the woes of the Bradys.

shooting

Podcast: Women and guns

Posted on by Caleb

Check out today’s podcast on women and the shooting sports. I’d like to thank Rachel Lucas, Bitter, and Breda for participating in the podcast, their answers were excellent and quite illuminating.

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If the embedded flash player doesn’t play the audio correctly, just hit the link labeled “download” to listen, or you can click this link to download it on iTunes.  We’ll be back to our regular podcast schedule next Monday.

news

Giving back to your community

Posted on by Caleb

The police department in Clarksburg, West Virginia is giving back to their community in a way that I can really get behind.

CLARKSBURG — The Clarksburg Police did a little spring cleaning Tuesday. The department spent the day clearing out its evidence locker in an effort to save the department some money.

The gist of it is that the PD went through their evidence locker and took about 70 guns which had been confiscated and traded them to a local gun shop in exchange for 10 new shotguns for the department.

Any guns that had the serial numbers removed were not traded, and those are slated to be destroyed.  The guns that were traded couldn’t be returned to the original owners for whatever reason, but instead of destroying them, it seems the PD had a little bit of common sense and decided to put them to good use.  I like that, because instead of destroying these guns, they can end up in the hands of a law-abiding gun owners, at at the same time help equip the police department even better.

Perhaps instead of gun buybacks, more departments should try taking confiscated firearms and using them to help fund their departments.  It’s not a bad idea, and I wouldn’t mind seeing a lot of those guns made available to the law-abiding public for sale.

Uncategorized

Guns and the Grand Canyon

Posted on by Caleb

Upon entering the Grand Canyon yesterday, the first thing I was greeted with was a large sign saying “no firearm”, referring to the current National Park Service rule which prohibits the carrying of concealed weapons in National Parks.  Now, you also know that NRA and the Senate are working to change this rule, but it currently remains in affect.

What I found amusing about the “no firearms” sign was that during our walking and driving through the park, I saw no fewer than a dozen signs warning of the dangers of approaching wildlife.  Things like “do not approach coyotes, they can bite and inflict serious injury” or “mountain lion area, use caution” were pretty common place.

I understand that wildlife is dangerous, and the park is under a legal obligation to post signs warning stupid tourists that it’s a bad idea to throw your ham sandwich to the cougar; it just seems odd that they would then deny you access to the tool that we invented in part because a human being is not a psychical match for a cougar in a fight.

blogs

Grand Canyon Travel Blog

Posted on by Caleb

As I mentioned, Mrs. Ahab has never been to Grand Canyon, and the last time I was there I was about 8 years old and didn’t really remember that much.  The Grand Canyon is about a 4.5 hour drive from Las Vegas, so we figured we’d saddle up for a nine-hour round trip to take in the Canyon.

We took a ton of pictures, so I’m going to put a cut in the blog.  All the pictures and blog tales are beneath the cut, so I don’t clutter up the home page.  It is totally worth it to check them out, although I must say that pictures honestly do not do the Canyon justice.  It is hard to express with pictures and adjectives the sheer sense of enormity and grandeur that came over me at the sight of the thing.  Certainly, it is a big hole in the ground, but it is magnificent in a way that I have a hard time explaining.  Click the cut to view the pictures. Click any of the pictures for the fullsize version.

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